Beckham hails Rooney

Wayne Rooney earned the plaudits of England captain David Beckham after firing England past Croatia into the Euro 2004 quarter-finals tonight.

Beckham paid tribute to the 18-year-old whose second consecutive double helped wipe out an early deficit and land a fine 4-2 victory in Lisbon.

Beckham told the BBC: “When you see Wayne perform nothing fazes him – it was a big game tonight and he produced again and he deserves all the praise he is going to get.”

But Rooney himself preferred to deflect praise towards his strike partner Michael Owen, insisting: “Michael hasn’t scored tonight but he’s set up a few for me and I think the partnership’s going well. We just go out there and do our jobs.”

On a magnificent night for England, Paul Scholes also shattered his three-year absence from the international scoresheet.

Beckham added: “Scholes doesn’t have to score goals because he does so much more for us but for his confidence and for us it’s great for him to get a goal now.

“I think we showed a lot of confidence especially in the first half – even when we went 1-0 down we were all over Croatia and we played our football which was important.

“We knew we’d break them down and with two players up front we knew we’d get goals.

“We all watched their game (Portugal’s) last night and we know what they can do well and what their players have. Ronaldo and Luis Figo had great games last night and it’ll be a tough game but we’ve got two days to relax now.”